I'm writing this commentary in November 2022, so... more than 16 years after the event. I can't find any record of the booking e-mails (which could have been on a long dead email account), or which account the payment was made from, or how much it was, or what the company's name was. I have a vague recollection that shot 0972 was of the office that we departed from. I could, however, be wrong. That had the imaginative name "Australian Helicopters" with the phone number (02) 9693-1188. That's now owned by Bondi Helicopters (if you believe their Faceplant page), or heliexperiences.com (if you believe their bookings address, although that looks like it's a cooperative page offering bookings all over Australia). They fly Bell 206 Jetrangers these days, although the helo parked outside their place (VH-HCU) is a shiny, then-new Robinson R22 Beta which was manufactured that very year. The R22 is the 2 seat version, the R44 is Robinson's 4 seat version.

And what are we in? I stupidly didn't get a shot from the outside, and even more stupidly didn't put a fresh memory card in so I didn't get a lot of shots from the inside either. However I could read the registration on the control panel; VH-BCJ. I went to look that up on the CASA (air regulator) registration database. CASA ensures that all of the required virtue signalling statements appear on their web page. It does NOT ensure that its database works, so that's typical of government priorities. The usually reliable Planespotters.net didn't have it listed either. Other places describe VH-BCJ as a Robinson R-44 Clipper II... but I wondered whether I could rely on that 16 years after the event, when the registration could have changed. I would say yes. VH-BCJ was built in 2003 (according to FlightAware), and is currently operated by Aero Logistics P/L of Mayfield West NSW. The front windows and the control panel do indeed look like those of an R44, and it would be a heck of a coincidence if a different R44 held the same rego in 2006. More significantly, in a later shot that I was processing... I saw "R44" embossed on the control panel.

Edit: The CASA register finally came up... as long as you do not enter a search term and are prepared to scroll through the pages starting at VH-AAA. The company name is the same, but the address is in Caloundra West Queensland. They became the registered operator on 18 September 2019.

By the way, when searching for the rego, the name Blue Sky Helicopters of Mascot came up. Some of their photos have "Aero Logistics" on the side which I doubt is a coincidence. The page states: "The company-owned (low time) aircraft are a superbly presented Bell 407 (VH-EXV), Bell 206 LongRanger (VH-DFN) and Robinson R44 Clipper II (VH-BCJ)." Given that VH-BCJ was first registered in 2003, I think their idea of "low time" is not my idea of "low time". FlightAware shows its most recent flight as being a loop over Sydney about a month ago as of the time of writing.